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By the Numbers:
Monday, Nov. 23, 2009 | 2 a.m.
In September, the construction industry, because of job losses, accounted for the smallest share of Nevada's workforce it has claimed since 1993. Across the country, employment in construction has declined by more than 20 percent in two years, and in states such as Nevada and Arizona that have relied heavily on the industry for growth in recent years, the decline has been even more pronounced.
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Construction workers have suffered more than most during this recession. Starting right at the tail end of 2007.
Back East, we used to laugh about the construction workers standing at the bar in the late fall, wearing bandages and limping. It only occurred in the late fall because, with the miserable winter coming, there was no chance of any work opening for 4-5 months. So they'd collect workmens comp weekly, and get a nice settlement when they were "healed". Better than UI. And especially if they were simply fired for being drunk.
Long winter coming here, too, Union Craftsmen. Even Texas isn't looking too good. Time to use the old noggin..Ouch, I'm injured!
My guess is if you figure in legitimate, long standing real estate and or mortgage people who have been impacted by this recession it may be greater than construction people.
I am not talking about fly by nighters, or greedy late comers that flew into the market in the peak years because the getting was good, but people that had been in the business for a while and have been out of commission for the past almost three years.
Just a thought and a guess about the impact.
In a construction-impacted economy as in Las Vegas, construction workers felt so job-secure as to become indebted for life in mortgaged homes during a housing boom fueled by easy credit. They were fully employed building more mortgaged homes.
Also, the developers went into debt designing, managing the housing construction projects, and marketing their newly built mortgaged homes.
The subsequently inescapable lending crunch caused construction workers to lose their mortgaged homes and jobs at the same time, because construction stopped from lack of credit-fueled sales. This lack of sales caused developers who employed construction workers to go broke.
The result is a severe economic collapse due to construction unemployment. The collapse has not yet finished and will continue endlessly like a dwindling spiral.
Construction-impacted economies, such as in Las Vegas, have a built-in, positive feedback, due to borrowed developing of borrowed homes occupied by borrowing construction workers having insecure jobs.
The lending crunch was caused by the Community Reinvestment Act, in which the Federal Government forced banks to lend money to unreliable borrowers. These unreliable borrowers were unable to pay off their mortgages. This caused banks to fail and lending to cease.
The Community Reinvestment Act's social engineering is intended to create a class-less society, in which bums essentially would live in palaces, while responsible, thrifty, productive, middle-class citizens would be forced to live in hovels.
The Community Reinvestment Act disregards Von Mises economic laws of human action. Behind the Community Reinvestment Act is a policy to destroy the Middle Class.
The destruction of the Middle Class is a prerequisite to ruthless, unlimited, corrupt government power by an entrenched oligarchy.
Our "propaganda ministry" will never allow people to understand this cunningly clever, ruthless power grab by an oligarchy that has been working on this for generations.
Hey bdover, it's different here. I just had a friend who after 2 mos. of an injury to his lumbar area, his MRI showed trauma to 2 discs, he got laid off from his job. He told me his doctors of deception, and workmans comp. co. manipulated the whole 2 mos. so he wouldn't be listed as a lost time accident.That would have made life harder for the contractor i.e, insurance and getting future jobs. My son works construction and developed 2 bumps on his lower abdomen, and yesterday they told him it could be swollen lymp nodes. They have scheduled an ultrasound and said it would take 7 days to get approval from the workers comp carrier, in the meantime.... this is definately not looking out for the patient.
A friend told me that as bad as it is if someone lost their leg on the job the doctor would mount a peg on his stub and send him back to work.
Great Britain needs skilled builders for the bridges that have been collapsing due to major floods..
That was more of a lecture then a comment ya think?
Ha, ha, BDOVER your comment is so funny because we all know that construction guys never REALLY get hurt in Vegas, ha, ha, do they? And then they get fired for drinking, ha, ha, and sign up for workman's comp after the fact, ha, ha, just like back east.
SCHNORCHEL:
Glen Beck just called. He he wants the CRAZY back before his show tonight!
The unions contributed to the collapsed of the construction industry in Vegas and the nation. This is a good time to abolished the unions like the autoworker's union and start from scratch. No more of those overpaid construction workers including high paid laborers that were paid much more than workers with college degrees. These days, it's not unusual to see skilled union construction workers begging for work near Home Depot parking lots and it's a very good time to go ahead with those stalled home improvement additions.
It would not surprise me, fremmasmind, that the doctors might be in bed with the contractors here. Back East, I believe it's different because the drooling liberals wouldn't stand for that crap. Once I really got injured on a job when a piece of miscellaneous steel hit my face, next to the eye. Stitches and all that. When I went to the Comp doc, he was only concerned that the wound wasn't closer, or in the eye. He said "I can only give you 15% injury, too bad, it could have been 30%". That's the difference, I guess.
I think that it has been ridiculous in this country to use the construction industry as an economic indicator. So what that home construction is up or down, what does that have to do with the fact that this country doesn't produce anything that the rest of the world wants anymore? This is the real issue. We need to protect our industry, Steel, and other natural resources, make good automobiles, ramp up our farming, our fertile plains can still be the bread basket for the rest of the world. We need to DO AWAY WITH NAFTA ! make it illegal for American companies to employ workers south of the border or in China. Keep those jobs right here in America. The construction industry should be massaged by federal dollars to rebuild our falling apart infrastructure and schools etc. These are real soultions to our failing economic stature.
So unclegig, your one of those little whimps who woundn't last 10 seconds on a job site and your jealous he gets paid more for actually producing something while you expect to get paid big bucks for screaming at people over the phone. Just because you have a piece of paper saying you accidently completed a course of study does not mean you are a valuable member of society. Having some Chinese guy write your term papers so you could party for 4 years only qualifies you as an expert in arrogance and ignorance.